Thursday, February 07, 2008

I Want Candy: Delices de Cartier

Candy comes in many different forms. Candy might be some fine chocolate, or candy might be a Cartier tank watch. For those of us watching both our waistlines and our budgets, candy might be nothing more (or less) than something sweet in a bottle. If candy is what you crave, consider Delices de Cartier.

I've had a sweet tooth all week. I had lined up Balenciaga Le Dix for today, but last night I found myself going through my sample drawer like an angry dieter rummaging the refrigerator in an attempt to locate a three-year-old squeeze bottle of diet Hershey's Chocolate Syrup. The pinker and the sweeter, the better. The thing is, my tastes don't generally run to pink and sweet. They run to white or yellow, they play around with red, and they like a little spice. I have lots and lots of white florals, ambers, incense, but very few selections that resembled anything Elle Woods might wear to her Contracts class at Harvard Law. I'd already worn my most obvious choice this week, and I didn't think you all would let me get by with a "Juicy Cooter, Part Deux." Seriously that fragrance just isn't that complex. I suppose I could have come up with some semiotic premise about their ads, claiming I only wore the perfume whilst deconstructing as an inspiration. But that would have made me pathetic. And also a nerd.

I was pawing my way through the tiny vials and carded samples when out popped Delices de Cartier. This fragrance, released in 2006, was all over the blogs when I first started sniffing. Anxious as I was then to plunge into the world of niche perfumery, I studiously avoided it. I lumped it in with all the other fruity florals everyone seemed to be complaining about, and went on my merry way with my Serge Lutens and L'Artisan. Never would I say that was a mistake, but I am happy I pulled this out last night and decided to wear it. If ever there were a fragrance for a very rich Barbie, then this is the one. I'm talking the kind of Barbie that had her own tailor, not the kind that wore those store-bought outfits from K-Mart, pinned to cardboard and shielded with a molded plastic casing. I'm talking about the Barbie who had the horse, and the car, and the townhouse, and the plane, and not one Ken but two--not the Barbie who only owned the camper and also used it as her home and had to share it with Skipper.

Please don't think you shouldn't try it just because I invoked Barbie. Because really you should, you must. True, this is pink and sweet, but it's also effervescent and feminine and wonderfully...well, delicious. The notes in Delices are iced cherry, bergamot, pink pepper, violet, jasmine, freesia, amber, tonka bean, musk, and sandalwood. It starts off with a tart cherry pop, a spicy pucker of fruit and pepper. As it develops the zing! subsides and the flowers bloom, pale and tender, making me long for the cherry trees around town to light up in all their pink glory. The dry down is sexy, sweet and intimate. I personally think this would make a lovely Valentine's Day selection, either for a gift or to wear. Occasionally a woman needs something to make her feel like a girl again. A little candy, if you will. You should. You must!